These days, the work of Adam Sandler might be likened to a bottle of domestic beer that has lost
its bubbles: cheap and flat.

So let’s focus on what works in his latest,
Blended — because he doesn’t.

Drew Barrymore, in her third pairing with Sandler, gives energy to her performance as Lauren, a
mother of two thrown together on an African vacation with this lump she met on a blind date at
Hooters.

Wendi McLendon-Covey, playing best friend Jen, delivers a comically furious turn and either
upstages Barrymore or forces Barrymore to play at her level.

When the two berate a snarky loser of a dad at Lauren’s son’s Little League game, the exchange
rivals that of Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson in
Wedding Crashers.

Also on the plus side is Terry Crews, who steals the movie as a singer of an African vocal group
at the Sun City resort where Jim (Sandler), the sad sporting-goods salesman, and Lauren, the
professional closet organizer, and their combined five children end up in an absurdly contrived
vacation.

The wild-eyed Crews — dancing and crooning, bumping and grinding — sings of the “blending” that
will go on during the week of nontraditional families watching wildlife and bonding. He serves as
the Greek chorus for the obvious, stale and stiff comedy — a shirtless jolt of life in the lesser
entry in the career of Sandler.

Jim is raising three emotionally stunted daughters to be the pseudo-jock that he is. He’s a
widower — which is meant to explain Sandler’s sleepwalking demeanor. His daughters need a
mother.

Lauren is newly divorced with a maddeningly rude and hormonal teen (Braxton Beckham) and
tantrum-tossing tween (Kyle Red Silverstein) — both of whom need a father figure, given that their
dad (Joel McHale) is a no-show.

Every setup is an eye-roller. Jim and Lauren stumble into each other at a drugstore, where he is
buying tampons for his teen and she is replacing a porn mag she ripped up for her teen.

Sandler aimlessly goes through the motions as a character dismissed as “a buffoon” and “a chubby
loser” in need of a fist bump.

In the stale-beer farce, even Barrymore — who has gotten rich on
The Wedding Singer and
50 First Dates — has a tough time giving him one.